People will be able to pursue and defend small claims more easily without fear of legal costs under ACT Government plans announced yesterday to revamp the Small Claims Court. At present people have a choice with claims of up to $5000: they can go to Small Claims, where there are no costs awarded, or the Magistrates Court, where costs can be awarded. ACT Attorney-General Terry Connolly said business and large organisations, including the ACT Government, usually pursued under-$5000 claims in the Magistrates courts using lawyers where they could get costs. This exposed many ordinary people to awards for costs. Now they would be required to go to the Small Claims Court, which would be renamed the Small Claims Tribunal. The tribunal would have much less formality and less legalistic procedure. Claims under $1000 would be determined by a referee, who would be legally qualified members of the court staff. There would be only limited appeal rights (to the Supreme Court with leave), bearing in mind the relatively small amounts of money at stake. Cases which involved legal complexity could be referred by the tribunal to the Magistrates Court. Mr Connolly thought that lawyers would object to being forced to start actions for under $5000 in the Small Claims Tribunal, but he defended the move saying it would improve access to justice because people found it difficult to defend claims in the more formal atmosphere of the Magistrates Court. Further, cases could be dealt with more quickly in the tribunal and the tribunal was less adversary and more aimed at finding a solution without strict application of the rules of evidence. Comment from the Law Society could not be obtained yesterday. Mr Connolly said that to date the Small Claims Court had improved access to low-cost justice in the ACT since being set up in 1974. But the time had come to improve it. The Chief Magistrate would head the tribunal and magistrates would be members. Other legally qualified people would also be appointed members. Mr Connolly said that when relatively small amounts were involved cheapness and speed of resolution tended to outweigh some of the problems that might arise with the streamlined procedure.